At least 52 people are feared dead and another 50 injured when a massive fire engulfed a six-storey factory in Bangladesh’s Narayanganj district, some 20 km from capital Dhaka.

The fire at a juice factory started around Thursday evening from the ground floor which later spread to the top floor. Following the incidents, multiple firefighting units were dispatched from Dhaka and nearby districts to douse the fire. Media reports say the factory building is burning.  Firefighters are still struggling to douse the flames.   

The death toll is likely to go up as many trapped people inside the building are feared to be dead.

Many people who were trapped on the second and third floors jumped off and sustained serious injuries. Of them, three succumbed to injuries, reported the Dhaka Tribune. 

Relatives of the factory workers later staged a demonstration on Thursday and blocked the Dhaka-Sylhet highway, forcing police to fire tear gas shells to disperse the crowd. 

 In February 2019, 70 people died when an inferno ripped through several Dhaka apartment blocks. As Bangladesh industrialized rapidly, there was a mushrooming of small industrial units with lax safety rules, resulting in over half a dozen major factory fires in the last decade. 

(SAM)